


Making New Friends

by jacquelee



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-31
Updated: 2015-12-31
Packaged: 2018-05-10 16:13:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5592745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jacquelee/pseuds/jacquelee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A little snippet about Toph and the badgermoles.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Making New Friends

**Author's Note:**

  * For [scribblemyname](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scribblemyname/gifts).



> Written for [Fandom Stocking 2015](http://fandom-stocking.dreamwidth.org)

It was so easy. She didn't need to see anything to be with them, she didn't need to talk to them to understand what they were communicating. There was no barrier between her and them. 

Since that first time, when she had been frightened by something that large coming up behind her but then realized that they weren't trying to eat her or trample her to death, she had learned so much from them. She had always known that she possessed the ability to earthbend but everybody would always forbid her to even do the easiest exercises. 

Now she had teachers. Teachers who showed her how to use her bending as another sense, a sense that replaced her sight very sufficiently. And she had friends. Friends who understood her. Friends who let her share their cave nearly every night now, because sneaking out had become second nature to her and was getting easier and easier. 

Snuggled into Sniffer's fur, she made plans about earthbending outside of the cave. She had heard of tournaments in town, those which only the strongest and toughest earthbendenders entered. Toph knew she was already good enough to compete against most other earthbenders. 

It was time to take the leap and test out her abilities against other humans. The badgermoles taught her all they knew and she was certain that was more than most humans knew, but they never used their earthbending abilities to fight. For them, as for her, they were a natural ability, something they just did. They were their eyes, just as much as they had always been Toph's.

But she was eager to use them for more. She was eager to prove that she was not weak, that she was in control of her life, that she could make her own choices. Here in the cave, she did. But she wanted to do it out there too. 

Not tonight though. The three badgermoles she spent most of her time with, whom she was calling Sniffer, Slurpy and Barky after their most prominent traits, were already asleep and Toph herself was very sleepy too. She rolled over onto her back and through Sniffer's body she felt the earth of the cave beneath her, just as much as she felt the earth above her and all around her. 

She sent little waves through it, not bending it per se, just trying out how to best get a clear picture of the surroundings. She got better and better at it, being able to ascertain what was around her to the millimeter. She felt the earth all around her shift microscopically and she laughed sleepily. 

Barky huffed a little in her sleep, a sound Toph knew was more of a smile than an actual huff. She huffed back, turned around again and fell asleep, knowing that her friends would keep her safe and that nothing could ever take her newfound freedom away from her.


End file.
